1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to knives and knife blades. The invention more specifically relates to knifes and knife blades for deboning poultry. This invention further relates to method for deboning poultry.
2. Background and Discussion of the Prior Art
In general, knives had blades of diverse configurations for different applications. U.S. Pat. No. 4,920,612, granted to Moore and U.S. Pat. No. 4,825,552, granted May 2, 1989 to Bendickson et al. disclose fish fillet knifes. U.S. Pat. No. 5,033,987 granted December 1997 to Libero discloses a chef's knife. US 2007/0204471 A1, published Sep. 6, 2007 to Castagna disclose a knife with a series of interchangeable and disposable blades. U.S. Pat. No. 5,086,561, granted Feb. 11, 1992 to Nathan discloses the combination of a safety knife having serrations for safety in combination with a safety garment for use in poultry processing operations.
In the field related specifically to poultry deboning, it was generally known to provide a series of knives for stepwise deboning operations. Each such deboning knife had a most distally disposed flesh penetration tip disposed adjacent the upper edge of the knife blade. FIG. 1 shows one embodiment of a prior art poultry deboning knife 1. Knife 1 has a handle 2 and blade 3. Blade 3 has an upper non-cutting edge 4 and a lower cutting curved cutting edge 5. A flesh penetration tip 6 is distally disposed immediately adjacent upper edge 4. FIG. 3 shows a second prior art poultry deboning knife 7. Knife 7 is used alone or alternatively in a stepwise manner with knife 1. Knife 7, likewise, has a flesh penetration tip 8 distally disposed and immediately adjacent upper non-cutting edge 9.
In the aforesaid manner of construction, the prior art poultry knives would readily penetrate the flesh to a prescribed limited depth by and at respective the penetration tip 6 or 8, and then the user in a facile motion would readily rotate the blade to readily assert a leverage force for each deboning operation.
In such prior art deboning operations, the operator would generally use a cloth or polymeric material glove for protection. The flesh penetration tip would, however, readily puncture the glove and flesh of the operator. This caused serious injury and labor issues, as well as interruption and disruption in the operations, with concomitant adverse costs associated with employee and production issues. The industry then went to metal chain-linked gloves. While the metal gloves prevented such further injuries, the operator would be readily fatigued with concomitant losses in productivity as well as hand and wrist impairment.
The poultry deboning art desired knives that were readily used by operators with a light, flexible cloth or polymeric gloves, while minimizing the prospect of puncture to the glove and to the flesh of the user, while still permitting high-volume accurate poultry deboning operations.
It is therefore a principal object of the present invention to provide a knife for improved poultry deboning.
It is another principal object of the present invention to provide a knife as aforesaid with improved safety in high volume poultry deboning.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a series of knives as aforesaid for stepwise deboning operations.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide knives as aforesaid of practical design and construction.
The aforesaid art needs and objects are achieved by knives of the present invention.